The difficult questions you must ask of your strategy – new APM white paper published

Association for Project Management (APM) has published the first in a series of white papers for the business leadership community, examining how project management and strategic transformation can help businesses stay resilient in a volatile landscape.

Titled The difficult questions you must ask of your strategy, the paper explores the questions that business leaders and their teams should ask to apply a strategic approach to change, ensuring their goals remain as achievable as possible in the face of uncertainty. 

The paper’s contributors include Dr Paul Chapman, former Vice President of APM (2020-24) and Director of the UK Government’s Major Project Leadership Academy, and Alistair Godbold, Vice President of APM and Director at The Nichols Group, both of whom urge UK business leaders to critically evaluate whether their strategies are deliverable, while highlighting the importance of integrating transformation initiatives with ongoing operations to drive sustainable success.

The pace of change in today’s business landscape means an organisation’s needs are never static. Technology is constantly changing and new challenges are emerging. Creating effective strategy is not easy. Business leaders need to have confidence in their strategy and its ability to deliver transformation, or risk falling short.

A recent APM survey of business leaders in the UK found the biggest obstacles to successful strategic execution include inadequate change delivery mechanisms and resistance to change.

The white paper highlights how project management principles and professional project practitioners can be the difference for business leaders when it comes to strategic execution. It also shows the importance of being able to continuously assess, question, re-evaluate and adapt an organisation’s strategy, to ensure it is one fit for the ever-changing demands of the future.

Read APM’s white paper The difficult questions you must ask of your strategy in full here.